Service areas
Custom Home Builder in Sussex County, Delaware
Sussex County is where most of our work has been, and the two things that shape a build here are water and sand. Ground water sits high through a lot of the county, and the soils south and east of Georgetown are sandy enough that they drain fast but hold very little. Both facts run straight into the septic design, and the septic design tends to drive the site plan.
AR-1 and GR, and what the sewer question does to them
Most rural and semi-rural Sussex land is zoned AR-1 Agricultural Residential. A single-family lot on its own septic system needs 32,670 square feet, three quarters of an acre, with 100 feet of width. Put that same lot on central sewer and the minimum drops to 20,000 square feet. There is a catch worth knowing: if the lot fronts a numbered road on the county's General Highway Map, the width requirement jumps to 150 feet regardless.
GR General Residential runs tighter. On central sewer it is 10,000 square feet with 75 feet of width. Without sewer it goes back to three quarters of an acre, same as AR-1, and the same 150-foot rule applies on numbered roads.
Cluster development is the release valve. Under the cluster provisions a septic lot can come down to half an acre and a sewered lot to 7,500 square feet, provided the soils and the other conditions support it. That is worth checking before you decide a parcel will not yield what you want.
Septic is usually the critical path
DNREC's Ground Water Discharges Section permits on-site wastewater systems, and in Sussex that permit is frequently what sets the schedule. A licensed Class H evaluator digs test pits and logs the soil profile and the seasonal high water table. On a sandy, fast-percolating site the answer can be a straightforward gravity system. On a wet site with mottling close to the surface it becomes a mound or a pressure-dosed system, the cost goes up, and the footprint the system needs starts dictating where the house can go.
We do not price a Sussex build from a plat alone. Test pits first, then a site plan that the septic design actually supports.
The coast changes the rules again
Lewes, Milton, Ocean View and the communities near the inland bays bring flood mapping into the conversation. Lowest floor elevation, freeboard above base flood elevation, foundation type and how the town measures building height all become design inputs rather than details, and the height limit interacts with the flood elevation in a way that can cost you a storey if nobody checks it early. Several of these towns also run historic review. Those pages are below.
Towns
Where we build in Sussex
Sussex is the county we cover fastest. Georgetown is about fifteen minutes from the office, the coastal towns twenty to twenty-five, and western Sussex around half an hour.
Seaford
City of Seaford
About 35 minGeorgetown
Town of Georgetown
About 15 minMillsboro
Town of Millsboro
LocalLewes
City of Lewes
About 25 minMilton
Town of Milton
About 25 minSelbyville
Town of Selbyville
About 25 minBridgeville
Town of Bridgeville
About 30 minLaurel
Town of Laurel
About 30 minOcean View
Town of Ocean View
About 20 minThe rest of Delaware
We build in all three counties. See New Castle County and Kent County, the full service area list, or go back to the homepage for completed work and how we price a build.
Thinking about building in Sussex County?
Send us the parcel number and we will tell you what we find before you spend anything. Zoning district, sewer or septic, who reviews it, and whether the lot will take the house you have in mind.